I’ve heard through the grapevine that a Director lateral to me is planning on going to the Board of Directors to try to encourage them to get rid of our CEO. I’m not sure what to do about this. My first instinct is to talk him out of it (he’ll almost certainly be fired, and maybe doesn’t realize it). We both report to the same person - I could conceivably go to my boss and give him a heads-up, but it’s entirely possible that he is in on it, and talking to him may backfire on me.
I’m wondering if I should let someone at the C-Level know about it (the CEO himself is inaccessible to me, but I have access to a trusted advisor). I’d prefer to stay as far away from all this as possible, and I can’t decide if I should approach directly or send an anonymous letter, or just stay out of it. My fear is that the straying Director will take the rest of us down with him when he goes.
Of course, I could always bury my head in the sand and hope for the best.
Unless this other director has the board on his side about firing the CEO (and, if he hasn’t recruited you yet, he doesn’t), all he’s doing is submitting his resignation unusually dramatically.
Nothing to gain for you by having any kind of involvement, only negatives. Shut up until it’s over.
“Heard through the grapevine” is just gossip, not knowledge, so he can truthfully say that he had no knowledge of it.
And why would anyone care if he did?
Maybe I’m misunderstanding the titles here. In my company we have “Directors” who are somewhere between Manager and VP. Then there are the directors on the Board of Directors. I assume that Winston Smith is the former not the latter.
This is a very simple equation. Two people (who happen to be high above you in the corporate ladder) are having a conflict. You can
a) support one party at the risk of making an enemy of the other, or
b) keep your mouth shut and your fingerprints off the plan until the Board sorts it out.
If I read the OP correctly, the person going to the board is a peer of Winston Smith, they report to the same boss. It’s possible to talk a peer out of something this rash, but it’s also possible that it blows up. I agree with the advice to stay out of it and let the chips fall where they may.
The only attempted mutiny I saw resulted in the head of the person leading the charge and his lieutenant. Is there a reason you other directors would hang?
No, I don’t have any direct ties to it. I thought that foreknowledge of the event somehow obligated me to tell the higher-ups, but I think that was just naiveté on my part. I’m going to stay out of it and deny any knowledge of it should anything actually happen.
Among the best life advice I ever got from anyone was “Don’t create drama where there isn’t any, and don’t stop a crisis if it’s in the natural course of events.” By telling what you know, which is unsubstantiated gossip, especially if you haven’t been asked, you may be creating unnecessary drama, and if you try to stop it, you may not only create a shitstorm, you’re going to find it raining down on you. If your co-worker is serious about what he’s doing, the best you can do stay the hell out of the way and let your co-worker deal with the consequences of his own actions.
Call a meeting and say that a director has a problem with how the CEO’s managing the company and would like to the Board to vote in favor of ousting him. Let each side present their arguments on why he should go/stay and solicit opinions all around. After the meeting, research the possible positives and negatives of making such a move, along with maybe getting the input of candidates that might replace the CEO and their plans on governing the company should it fall to them. Have all the department heads weigh in, take a poll of employees, and then have a vote of the Board on the final decision once all the facts come in.
